Bright Summer Hues

It is hard to believe that August is here and my children are getting ready to go back to school. It makes me want to savor the summer sun before fall makes its entrance. Summer is filled with radiant colors, and I love using them in children’s rooms. There are so many ways to express color and step away from the traditional primary color palette.

Nothing says happy more than orange and yellow. You can easily turn up the color in a room with special accent art, and you can change it often and still have your basic cream walls to work with.

Santa Monica, CA based Annette is the creator of the interior decor lines, House, Little House and Annette Tatum Collections. She is also the author of The Well-Dressed Home, which features her universal style guide for translating your sense of fashion into home design.

The first room — the Stockholm children’s room — is really nice. I think you’d indeed be more flexible about adding bright and sunny-colored elements all over the room when you have light and neutral walls, compared to when you have a floral wallpaper like the second photo.

The great thing about having a room like any of these is that summer lives forever and goes on throughout the year, even if the snow is falling right outside your window! It lifts up our moods and cheers us.

True, Gwendolynne. One of my kids has lots of yellows in her room and a little bit of pink. It truly makes me happy when I go inside her room. Whenever I feel sad or worried about something, I simply go there to clear my head.